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Comment by ip26 | Hacker News Reader

The good news, young parents, is you have a couple years to get it together. A infant wants to see your smiling face, but also won’t be scarred for life if you sometimes look away at a screen. Commit yourself to setting a good example, work on it, and know that while you will slip, you’ve also got time to improve.

Some good steps are zero phones at family eating times, kid book time, and kid bed time. I personally also think it’s important you are visibly alone when you are on a screen, in other words don't let your kids see you ignoring another adult for the screen. Like a modern smoke break.

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I find my mobile capable Apple Watch to be useful for this. When I come home, I can put the phone on the ledge where I put keys and wallet, and still be reachable.

Or when playing outside or going for a walk. No phone in pocket means it is harder to get distracted.

Interesting, I would assume a smartwatch on your wrist would make it way more easy to get distracted. But I've never worn a smartwatch so maybe I'm wrong.

My experience (as someone who spends too much time on my phone) is that a smartwatch helps avoiding me getting sucked in by my phone.

It’s much less usable and I hate constant notifications on my wrist, so I’ll usually have it on mute and do a quick check at my notifications occasionally to see if there’s anything urgent (usually work or a message from my wife).

I’ll mostly ignore my group chats on WhatsApp and emails, and there’s no risk of me getting sucked into group coversations with friends, YouTube or the Internet (I don’t have social media apps on my phone so that’s not too much of an issue), which is where the real time sink is for me.

Concur with parent post. I find the watch (Samsung here) to provide me with reassurance that servers aren't all down, CEO isn't sending bat signals, etc. I leave my phone in the cat when I go to dinner with wife and other attention-sensitive scenarios.

That can’t be pleasant for the cat…

Cats took over the internet a few years ago, now they are going after the phones

My main distraction/entertainment is reading on the internet (like HN), and I cannot do that on the watch. And it’s difficult to message back and forth, plus I have those notifications off.

Same thing when going to sleep, I don’t take phone near the bed, just have the watch on which has my alarms to wake me up with vibrate function.

I keep my smartphone plugged in whenever I'm not traveling away from home for exactly this reason. I know there are Android watches that don't require an Internet connection to a powered on phone, but the Apple Watch has been awesome for reducing my screen usage in general. I'm never tempted to "play" or "consume" on it, except for podcasts or music; it's just a very task-oriented device.

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